Project Summary

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The Nez Perce Tribe began watershed restoration projects in 1996. Accomplishments have included excluding cattle from critical riparian areas through fencing, stabilizing stream banks, decommissioning roads, restoring fish passage, re-planting riparian areas, treating noxious weeds, and re-constructing stream channels. Coordination of these projects is critical to the success of the restoration of the various Subbasins. Coordination actions also include department coordination, subbasin planning, and treaty area coordination.

This project is not amenable to scientific review because it functions at the policy and administrative level. It is not based on science principles, and there are no provisions for monitoring or evaluation. However, the project performs an important coordination function and continues to facilitate significant on-the-ground restoration actions. The objectives are clearly defined, benefits to fish and wildlife seem likely, and the coordination and public engagement activities are consistent with the Council's Fish and Wildlife Program. The efforts to coordinate with the U.S. Forest Service have been especially effective in developing a ridgetop to ridgetop approach, consistent with the landscape approach recommended by the ISAB (ISAB 2011-4).

To facilitate the evaluation of administrative projects, the ISRP previously recommended (ISRP 2007-14) that project managers develop a set of performance metrics that relate to the projects goals and objectives, and that these metrics be identified in the proposal, and then used to measure progress toward meeting project performance targets. Project managers and participants are best able to determine suitable metrics or indicators of success and to develop a plan to measure and evaluate project success on the basis of these indicators.

Watersheds and habitats throughout the Nez Perce Tribe’s treaty territory have been impacted by agriculture, logging, road construction, mining, and grazing. Subbasin plans for the Asotin, Grande Ronde, Imnaha, and Tucannon watersheds, and the recovery plans for Idaho Snake River spring/summer Chinook and steelhead have identified factors limiting anadromous salmonids within the Tribe’s treaty territory. These plans also identified actions that should be taken to ameliorate limiting factors and promote recovery.

The goal of this project is to build on subbasin and recovery plans to develop and implement a comprehensive restoration program through coordination with multiple jurisdictions, agencies, and private landowners. The project has five objectives: oversee the development of project proposals; identify areas that need restoration and protection; communicate to local communities how tribal cultural values and restoration actions are connected; maximize the social and economic benefits of restoration activities; and participate in local and technical advisory groups. This type of coordination has led to important restoration partnerships and significant restoration actions in the region.

Fifteen years ago this project established a unique partnership with the U.S. Forest Service in the Nez Perce Clearwater National Forest, leading to eight BPA projects that decommissioned 376 miles of roads, replaced 42 culverts, stabilized stream banks, restored riparian and stream areas, produced road/stream crossing inventories, provided 31 miles of fencing to protect riparian areas from grazing, and developed off-channel watering sites for livestock. Since then, similar partnering agreements have been established involving the Clearwater, Nez Perce, Wallowa-Whitman, and the Umatilla National Forests. These agreements with the Forest Service have helped to cultivate partnerships with the Nez Perce and Latah Conservation Districts (CD) in Idaho, Asotin, Columbia and Pomeroy CD’s in S.E. Washington, and Wallow County in N.E. Oregon. In the Clearwater Subbasin, the project also established cooperative restoration partnerships with the Potlatch Corporation, Idaho Department of Lands, conservation districts, and the Bureau of Land Management. Currently, the project oversees eleven BPA habitat funded restoration projects in the Snake and Clearwater River basins.

More recently, this project supported the “Expert Panel Process” in the Clearwater, Salmon, Tucannon, Imnaha, and Grande Ronde rivers. It also supports participation by the Nez Perce Tribe in the Grande Ronde Model Watershed Program, the Natural Resource Advisory Committee, and the Snake River Salmon Recovery Board. Additionally the project contributes to regional monitoring and evaluation efforts including the Columbia Habitat Monitoring Program, Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership Habitat Data Sharing Workgroup and the Northwest Environmental Data Network. The project promotes policy coordination by holding meetings with Forest Supervisors, District Rangers, County Commissioners, state agency policy representatives, and others.

The project has supported innovation and passive adaptive management. Establishing a partnership with the Forest Service in Nez Perce Clearwater National Forest was novel at the time it occurred. The Expert Panel process showed that greater biological benefits could be expected from projects targeting relatively large geographic areas. Once this knowledge was available, the project sponsors worked with BPA to obtain additional funds to increase the work area of projects within Nez Perce territorial lands.

Evaluation of Results

This coordination and development project began in 1996. In 1998, funding was increased to $90K, supporting the Director of the Watershed Division in Nez Perce Tribe's Department of Fisheries Resource Management. This position has been responsible for coordinating at a policy level habitat restoration efforts within the Clearwater River Subbasin and in other watersheds within the Nez Perce Tribe's Treaty Territory, including the development of subbasin plans last decade. Funding was $147K in 2012

The Watershed Division has had multiple partners including federal, state, and local government agencies as well as private landowners, and has managed 11 separate implementation projects in the Grande Ronde in Oregon east to the South Fork Salmon River north to the Clearwater River and east to the Lochsa River near the Montana border.

In the Clearwater Subbasin, the Nez Perce Tribe has focused its partnership efforts on relationships with the Clearwater and Nez Perce National Forests, Potlatch Corporation, Idaho Department of Lands, and conservation districts, and in 2012, with the Bureau of Land Management. This project allowed the Tribe to work together with the Idaho Clearwater Focus co-coordinator in developing the Clearwater River Policy Advisory Committee in 1996, and to develop an implementation strategy to complete the Clearwater Subbasin Plan in 2002 and 2003 that were adopted by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council in 2005. The Clearwater River Policy Advisory Committee has since been replaced by two new groups: the Clearwater Technical Group and the Core Review Team. In 2012, this project coordinated and participated in the Expert Panel Process in the Clearwater River, the Salmon River, Tucannon River, Imnaha River, and Grande Ronde River. This project also participated in the regional forum for monitoring and evaluation including the Columbia Habitat Monitoring Program and PNAMPs Habitat Data Sharing Workgroup.

The Nez Perce Tribe and the Forest Service continue to work in partnership on all projects that occur on Forest Service Lands. The Forest Service continues to contribute at least 20% match on projects overall, as required in a Memorandum of Understanding that was signed between the Forest Service and Bonneville Power Administration. Since 2011, these partners have defined goals and strategies for communicating watershed restoration work and created an organizational chart that defines their roles and facilitates the day-to-day interactions of implementing habitat restoration projects.

Two workshops have been presented annually to a variety of audiences from local communities, local businesses, and agency personnel. Topics ranged from cultural history and how this history is used to drive watershed restoration projects to restoration opportunities for local contractors to best management practices to preserve fish habitat.

The project’s most significant partnership has been with the Forest Service’s Nez Perce Clearwater National Forest. Similar relationships are now in place on the Payette, Boise, Umatilla, and Wallow Whitman National Forests. The project also interacts with the Snake River Salmon Recovery Board in Washington, with conservation districts in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington, the Idaho Department of Lands, Idaho office of Species Conservation, the Bureau of Land Management, and with other federal, state, and local agencies plus private landowners and corporations. A number of BPA and non-BPA funded projects are associated with this project. Among them are the following eleven Nez Perce Tribe projects, Protect and Restore the Crooked and American River Watersheds, Newsome Creek Watershed Restoration, Red River Watershed Restoration, Lower South Fork Clearwater River Watershed Restoration, Lolo Creek Watershed Restoration, Restore Selway River Watershed, Protect and Restore Lochsa River Watershed, Protect and Restore Lapwai Creek Watershed, Protect and Restore Northeast Oregon, Slate Creek Watershed Restoration, and East Fork of South Fork Salmon River Passage. Other non-Nez Perce Tribe activities that complement the project are: Lower Clearwater and Potlatch Watersheds Habitat Improvements (Idaho Accord project), Potlatch River Watershed Restoration (Latah Soil and Water Conservation District), Lapwai Creek Anadromous Habitat (Nez Perce Soil and Water Conservation District), Tucannon River Programmatic Habitat Project (Snake River Salmon Recovery Board), and Asotin Creek Enhancement and Restoration (Asotin County Conservation District).

The emerging limiting factors of climate change and non-native species were identified. The potential impacts of climate change were clearly articulated. Restoration actions being coordinated by the project are designed to accommodate 100-year floods. Increased fish passage, restoration of riparian areas through plantings and reconnections to the floodplain, reductions in sedimentation, and other actions are expected to dampen the potential impacts of a warming climate. Procedures to reduce the prevalence of invasive weeds in restoration project areas are being used. Brook trout were identified as being an invasive fish species that could negatively impact the restoration of steelhead, spring Chinook, and other indigenous salmonids. In some cases these fish will be euthanized if they are captured during routine electroshocking surveys; however, no systematic plan for their control appears to be in place.

4. Deliverables, Work Elements, Metrics, and Methods

The project has three deliverables: regional coordination of restoration projects; coordination of public outreach related to watershed restoration; and management, coordination, and communication. The first deliverable is to coordinate the habitat restoration efforts of multiple groups, including federal, state, and local government agencies and private landowners. The second deliverable is to educate restoration professionals and the general public about the Nez Perce Tribe's habitat restoration activities, as a means to create additional partnerships and funding opportunities. The last deliverable is to manage project implementation by attending meetings and workshops on habitat restoration, seeking additional funding, scheduling projects, supervising employees, preparing statements of work, managing budgets, and completing reports.

This project is not amenable to scientific review because it functions at the policy and administrative level. It is not based on science principles, and there are no provisions for monitoring or evaluation. However, the project performs an important coordination function and continues to facilitate significant on-the-ground restoration actions. The objectives are clearly defined, benefits to fish and wildlife seem likely, and the coordination and public engagement activities are consistent with the Council's Fish and Wildlife Program. The efforts to coordinate with the U.S. Forest Service have been especially effective in developing a ridgetop to ridgetop approach, consistent with the landscape approach recommended by the ISAB (ISAB 2011-4).

To facilitate the evaluation of administrative projects, the ISRP previously recommended (ISRP 2007-14) that project managers develop a set of performance metrics that relate to the projects goals and objectives, and that these metrics be identified in the proposal, and then used to measure progress toward meeting project performance targets. Project managers and participants are best able to determine suitable metrics or indicators of success and to develop a plan to measure and evaluate project success on the basis of these indicators.

Watersheds and habitats throughout the Nez Perce Tribe’s treaty territory have been impacted by agriculture, logging, road construction, mining, and grazing. Subbasin plans for the Asotin, Grande Ronde, Imnaha, and Tucannon watersheds, and the recovery plans for Idaho Snake River spring/summer Chinook and steelhead have identified factors limiting anadromous salmonids within the Tribe’s treaty territory. These plans also identified actions that should be taken to ameliorate limiting factors and promote recovery.

The goal of this project is to build on subbasin and recovery plans to develop and implement a comprehensive restoration program through coordination with multiple jurisdictions, agencies, and private landowners. The project has five objectives: oversee the development of project proposals; identify areas that need restoration and protection; communicate to local communities how tribal cultural values and restoration actions are connected; maximize the social and economic benefits of restoration activities; and participate in local and technical advisory groups. This type of coordination has led to important restoration partnerships and significant restoration actions in the region.

Fifteen years ago this project established a unique partnership with the U.S. Forest Service in the Nez Perce Clearwater National Forest, leading to eight BPA projects that decommissioned 376 miles of roads, replaced 42 culverts, stabilized stream banks, restored riparian and stream areas, produced road/stream crossing inventories, provided 31 miles of fencing to protect riparian areas from grazing, and developed off-channel watering sites for livestock. Since then, similar partnering agreements have been established involving the Clearwater, Nez Perce, Wallowa-Whitman, and the Umatilla National Forests. These agreements with the Forest Service have helped to cultivate partnerships with the Nez Perce and Latah Conservation Districts (CD) in Idaho, Asotin, Columbia and Pomeroy CD’s in S.E. Washington, and Wallow County in N.E. Oregon. In the Clearwater Subbasin, the project also established cooperative restoration partnerships with the Potlatch Corporation, Idaho Department of Lands, conservation districts, and the Bureau of Land Management. Currently, the project oversees eleven BPA habitat funded restoration projects in the Snake and Clearwater River basins.

More recently, this project supported the “Expert Panel Process” in the Clearwater, Salmon, Tucannon, Imnaha, and Grande Ronde rivers. It also supports participation by the Nez Perce Tribe in the Grande Ronde Model Watershed Program, the Natural Resource Advisory Committee, and the Snake River Salmon Recovery Board. Additionally the project contributes to regional monitoring and evaluation efforts including the Columbia Habitat Monitoring Program, Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership Habitat Data Sharing Workgroup and the Northwest Environmental Data Network. The project promotes policy coordination by holding meetings with Forest Supervisors, District Rangers, County Commissioners, state agency policy representatives, and others.

The project has supported innovation and passive adaptive management. Establishing a partnership with the Forest Service in Nez Perce Clearwater National Forest was novel at the time it occurred. The Expert Panel process showed that greater biological benefits could be expected from projects targeting relatively large geographic areas. Once this knowledge was available, the project sponsors worked with BPA to obtain additional funds to increase the work area of projects within Nez Perce territorial lands.

Evaluation of Results

This coordination and development project began in 1996. In 1998, funding was increased to $90K, supporting the Director of the Watershed Division in Nez Perce Tribe's Department of Fisheries Resource Management. This position has been responsible for coordinating at a policy level habitat restoration efforts within the Clearwater River Subbasin and in other watersheds within the Nez Perce Tribe's Treaty Territory, including the development of subbasin plans last decade. Funding was $147K in 2012

The Watershed Division has had multiple partners including federal, state, and local government agencies as well as private landowners, and has managed 11 separate implementation projects in the Grande Ronde in Oregon east to the South Fork Salmon River north to the Clearwater River and east to the Lochsa River near the Montana border.

In the Clearwater Subbasin, the Nez Perce Tribe has focused its partnership efforts on relationships with the Clearwater and Nez Perce National Forests, Potlatch Corporation, Idaho Department of Lands, and conservation districts, and in 2012, with the Bureau of Land Management. This project allowed the Tribe to work together with the Idaho Clearwater Focus co-coordinator in developing the Clearwater River Policy Advisory Committee in 1996, and to develop an implementation strategy to complete the Clearwater Subbasin Plan in 2002 and 2003 that were adopted by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council in 2005. The Clearwater River Policy Advisory Committee has since been replaced by two new groups: the Clearwater Technical Group and the Core Review Team. In 2012, this project coordinated and participated in the Expert Panel Process in the Clearwater River, the Salmon River, Tucannon River, Imnaha River, and Grande Ronde River. This project also participated in the regional forum for monitoring and evaluation including the Columbia Habitat Monitoring Program and PNAMPs Habitat Data Sharing Workgroup.

The Nez Perce Tribe and the Forest Service continue to work in partnership on all projects that occur on Forest Service Lands. The Forest Service continues to contribute at least 20% match on projects overall, as required in a Memorandum of Understanding that was signed between the Forest Service and Bonneville Power Administration. Since 2011, these partners have defined goals and strategies for communicating watershed restoration work and created an organizational chart that defines their roles and facilitates the day-to-day interactions of implementing habitat restoration projects.

Two workshops have been presented annually to a variety of audiences from local communities, local businesses, and agency personnel. Topics ranged from cultural history and how this history is used to drive watershed restoration projects to restoration opportunities for local contractors to best management practices to preserve fish habitat.

The project’s most significant partnership has been with the Forest Service’s Nez Perce Clearwater National Forest. Similar relationships are now in place on the Payette, Boise, Umatilla, and Wallow Whitman National Forests. The project also interacts with the Snake River Salmon Recovery Board in Washington, with conservation districts in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington, the Idaho Department of Lands, Idaho office of Species Conservation, the Bureau of Land Management, and with other federal, state, and local agencies plus private landowners and corporations. A number of BPA and non-BPA funded projects are associated with this project. Among them are the following eleven Nez Perce Tribe projects, Protect and Restore the Crooked and American River Watersheds, Newsome Creek Watershed Restoration, Red River Watershed Restoration, Lower South Fork Clearwater River Watershed Restoration, Lolo Creek Watershed Restoration, Restore Selway River Watershed, Protect and Restore Lochsa River Watershed, Protect and Restore Lapwai Creek Watershed, Protect and Restore Northeast Oregon, Slate Creek Watershed Restoration, and East Fork of South Fork Salmon River Passage. Other non-Nez Perce Tribe activities that complement the project are: Lower Clearwater and Potlatch Watersheds Habitat Improvements (Idaho Accord project), Potlatch River Watershed Restoration (Latah Soil and Water Conservation District), Lapwai Creek Anadromous Habitat (Nez Perce Soil and Water Conservation District), Tucannon River Programmatic Habitat Project (Snake River Salmon Recovery Board), and Asotin Creek Enhancement and Restoration (Asotin County Conservation District).

The emerging limiting factors of climate change and non-native species were identified. The potential impacts of climate change were clearly articulated. Restoration actions being coordinated by the project are designed to accommodate 100-year floods. Increased fish passage, restoration of riparian areas through plantings and reconnections to the floodplain, reductions in sedimentation, and other actions are expected to dampen the potential impacts of a warming climate. Procedures to reduce the prevalence of invasive weeds in restoration project areas are being used. Brook trout were identified as being an invasive fish species that could negatively impact the restoration of steelhead, spring Chinook, and other indigenous salmonids. In some cases these fish will be euthanized if they are captured during routine electroshocking surveys; however, no systematic plan for their control appears to be in place.

4. Deliverables, Work Elements, Metrics, and Methods

The project has three deliverables: regional coordination of restoration projects; coordination of public outreach related to watershed restoration; and management, coordination, and communication. The first deliverable is to coordinate the habitat restoration efforts of multiple groups, including federal, state, and local government agencies and private landowners. The second deliverable is to educate restoration professionals and the general public about the Nez Perce Tribe's habitat restoration activities, as a means to create additional partnerships and funding opportunities. The last deliverable is to manage project implementation by attending meetings and workshops on habitat restoration, seeking additional funding, scheduling projects, supervising employees, preparing statements of work, managing budgets, and completing reports.

Although the ISRP places this proposal in the administrative category, this proposal is not justified as presented. This proposal provides similar functions as the Soil and Water Conservation Districts' coordinator, proposal 199608600, and the ISRP comments for both projects apply to each. This project may be an essential element of stewardship for the subbasin. But based on the proposal, it is not clear that this project is showing results in the basin for restoration and evaluation.

This project is supposed to provide vital services, but it is not clear what essential functions this individual provides, and what would happen regarding Clearwater subbasin integration and facilitation of other Council Fish and Wildlife Program proposals if this coordination was not available. Almost all the proposals covered under this focus coordination project also request FTE and funding to perform the same tasks. It does not appear that critical monitoring and evaluation or watershed assessment coordination is being performed under this project. The projects under the NPT Focus watershed auspices from the Clearwater and Grand Ronde subbasins need substantial improvement. So it is unclear how the supervision provided by this project is informing those efforts. Further evidence of essential functions being provided by this coordination is needed. The ISRP's province review recommendation included the statement: "This project should demonstrate performance by the next review cycle otherwise it should be terminated."

As with other watershed coordinator proposals, the proposed effort would be better integrated into a proposal that is directed toward management based on science including on-the-ground work and monitoring.

Technical and scientific background: The details of the essential functions this project provides to the various subbasins in the Nez Perce ceded lands in not clear from the technical and scientific background. Coordination across the subbasins in developing standards for conducting habitat and fish inventories, watershed assessments, decision matrices for picking projects, and evaluating the efficacy of habitat restoration is not sufficiently described.

Rationale and significance to subbasin plans and regional programs: There is identification throughout this section that the Fish and Wildlife Program and NOAA recovery programs call for integration and coordination. What is not clear is that the tasks executed through this project actually accomplish that integration and coordination.

Relationships to other projects: There are a number of important projects listed. What is missing is the actual tasks this project performed for these other projects. Each of these other projects request time and funds for their own coordination and integration and BPA and NEPA permitting. It is not clear what functions this project adds to those.

Project history: A short history of the origin of the Focus Watershed Coordinator for the Nez Perce tribe is given. The history does not provide evidence of implications for management, i.e., that management actions have been influenced by the outcome of the coordination.

Objectives: The objectives are laudable. Note, however, that the project history does not contain results in terms of the stated objectives. There are some measurable objectives identified, for example, "Continue riparian recovery to achieve at least 75% riparian function (Tucannon River)." For other objectives, like "Coordinate with groups and the public when developing and implementing fish and wildlife activities in the subbasin" (Imnaha), it is more difficult to define measurable objectives. The coordination objectives are quite vague in almost all cases.

Tasks (work elements) and methods: The exact work elements are vague. For example, page 19: Identify and select highest priority watershed restoration projects with the treaty territory based on the respective subbasin management plans. This does not tell reviewers what decision and analytical framework is employed in establishing the priority list.

Monitoring and evaluation: Coordinating monitoring and evaluation is not formally discussed.

Facilities, equipment, and personnel: 3.3 FTEs are requested. The specific tasks these individuals perform and the time allocated is not adequately described.

Information transfer: Information will be provided upon request and in quarterly and annual BPA reports. The documentation is not likely to provide easy evaluation of the need for the coordination.